Business

2016 has thus far been a year characterized by remarkable bouts of harrowing volatility as the ongoing devaluation of the yuan, plunging crude prices, and geopolitical uncertainty wreak havoc on fragile, inflated markets.

With asset prices still sitting near nosebleed levels after seven years of bubble blowing by a global cabal of overzealous central planners with delusions of Keynesian grandeur, some fear a dramatic unwind is in the cards and that this one will be the big one, so to speak.

It was less than a day ago when Gartman, in his latest appearance on the nepotism-challenged CNBC, said that not only is the bottom for oil not in yet, but that a selling "panic" could push it down as low as $15: after all with Standard Chartered coming out with a $10 forecast, it was suddenly cool to have dire predictions about the black gold's downside risk.

This is what he said:

• China trade surprise brings relief (Reuters)
• Obama knocks Trump, voices optimism (Reuters)
• Republican Candidates Criticize Obama’s State of the Union Address (WSJ)
• Republicans and Democrats Agree: We Hate Wall Street (WSJ)
• Oil rises for first time in eight sessions on China, U.S. stocks draw (Reuters)
• U.S. Exports First Freely Traded Oil in 40 Years (WSJ)
• China Imports Record Crude as Price Crash Accelerates Buying (BBG)
• Can We Fix American Cities by Tearing Them Down? (BBG)

Last April, the financial markets cheered the biggest restructuring in GE's history when the oligopoly announced the dramatic shrinkage of GE Capital but more importantly, GE  announced the largest, at the time, stock buyback in history, repurchasing some $50B in shares. 

After several of weeks of sharp currency devaluation, the market was carefully watching last night's China trade data to see if the Yuan debasement had led to a positive trade outcome to the world's second biggest economy, and as reported last night, it was not disappointed when China reported a December trade surplus of $60.09 billion from $54.1 billion in November, as a result of exports rising (2.3%), the first increase since June, while imports declined by just 4%, the lowest since 2014 despite China importing a record amount of oil, or 33.2 million tons, ostensibly to take advantage of